McCain or Obama

[Phronesis]

My thinking is towards tax fairness. I don't have any opinions about Bush's tax cuts, I don't know much about them. Was it fair in its implementation?

 

[km2]

My thinking is towards tax fairness. I don't have any opinions about Bush's tax cuts, I don't know much about them. Was it fair in its implementation?

Fairness is a very fluffy term, and doesn't help prove the case for either side.

Is it fair that 1% of Americans have 40% of the wealth?

Is it fair that the circumstance you happen to be born in can have so much effect on what you can potentially achieve?

Is it fair to take wealth away from people who've worked hard for it, and give it to a bunch of other people?

I don't think one can support capitalism or socialism based on some absolute sense of fairness since both would fail a pure fairness test. Capitalist ideals are needed to make sure that people have real encouragement to work and achieve their goals, and to give them a feeling of responsibility in the system (it's my stuff so I'll look after it). Social taxation is needed to make sure that other people who aren't born with a silver spoon in their mouth are given the opportunity to reach their full potential. In the long run it pays off for everybody because more skilled working people creates a larger amount of useful work. One needs to avoid the capitalistic centralisation of wealth, where everyone becomes dependent on a few rich industrialists for their economic wellbeing. One also needs to avoid the socialist centralisation of wealth, where everyone becomes dependent on the state for their economic wellbeing.

It comes down to balance and removing single points of failure. Absolute capitalist or absolute socialist systems are a recipe for failure. There's a happy middle which one needs to reach, and one which I think Obama has more clearly thought through, rather than McCain's handwaving and saying the invisible hand of the free market will sort everything out.

 

[Lord Anubis]

Either way Joe the plumber's going to get screwed over..but on energy I'm with McCain and on Iraq with Obama. Those issues have long term global impact consequences

 

[Fudzy]

A vote for McCain is a vote for an older, grumpier version of Bush, no thanks.

 

[Claymore]

My opinion remains the same. Penalizing 5% (the rich) by not lowering their taxes too is unfair. Typical wealth redistribution. Besides, by not giving a tax break to high income earners (like low income earners) it in many cases penalizes the job-providers of the economy. Create wealth through hard work, don't redistribute it.

You do know that Obama's tax plan includes a tax credit for each new job created, right?

Also, regarding the fairness of tax distribution: remember that while the rich pay proportionally more taxes, they also consume proportionally more of the country's resources. In addition, they're in a far better position to be able to reduce the percentage of tax they pay than the poorer taxpayers are.

As an illustration: Cindy McCain's tax details were released on Friday. Of the $4.2 million she earned for the last year, she paid tax at a rate of 26%. Does that sound high?